Nationwide Building Society has launched a partnership with Swindon Borough Council to invest £50m into a community housing project.
The investment, which will take place over a number of years, aims to provide new homes for the town, and will include a provision for affordable homes.
Its first project will be to redevelop the Oakfield campus site, a 5ha brownfield space allocated for housing. The scheme follows strong Nationwide member feedback that the society should support new practical approaches to housing.
The initiative will also involve locals with the planning for and design of the site, which could accommodate more than 200 new homes.
Six-month consultation
The initial consultation, which starts today, could last up to six months and help determine key aspects of the development, including green spaces and facilities to benefit the wider local community.
Subject to further discussion with Swindon Borough Council and securing planning consent, construction is expected to begin in 2019.
The initiative is designed to break even through sales and rentals, and any profit will be reinvested in other Nationwide community projects.
Joe Garner, Nationwide’s chief executive, said: “Building on our housing heritage, our mutual purpose, and our founding principle that people can achieve more together than they can alone, we aim to show that it’s possible to develop quality homes at fair prices.
“By challenging existing practice in just a small way here in Swindon and ensuring the views of locals shape our development, we hope to make an innovative contribution to the national housing debate.”
Toby Elliott, Swindon Borough Council’s cabinet member for strategic planning and sustainability, said: “The Oakfield campus has been allocated for housing use since 2013 and has been unoccupied since the university closed seven years ago. We look forward to working with Nationwide and local residents as the plans develop.”
Latest initiative
The Oakfield project is the latest initiative within Nationwide’s new five-year social investment programme, aimed at helping people “find a place fit to call home”, after the society’s members voted housing as the top issue concerning them.
Separately, under its existing national community funding programme, Nationwide expects to invest an additional £20m by 2022 to help communities across the country tackle their housing issues, and will invite local members to vote on which projects to support. The programme is being piloted in Northern England, before going nationwide in 2018.
Additionally, to promote the health and development of the private rented sector, and provide views to government, Nationwide earlier this year assembled an industry-wide partnership board, backed by the National Landlords Association, the Association of Residential Letting Agents, Shelter, Countrywide and the Nationwide Foundation.
Joe Garner added: “From supporting the world’s first garden city in the early 1900s, to championing the creation of homes for returning servicemen after both world wars, Nationwide has played an innovative role in helping millions of people secure a home of their own. After all, we are a building society.”
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